Schnepf Farms: Cornfields and Mazes and Goats

Last but not least we come to the attractions part of Schnepf Farms, and there are quite a few to cover!

First and foremost, this time of year is the two cornfield mazes they have on the property. I had always wanted to go through a cornfield maze but time or cash never permitted me to go before, so this was a mandatory part of our trip. Schnepf Farms' website advertises a 10 acre cornfield maze with a design honoring Steve Nash ( it should have been the Diamondbacks, we had a killer season this year and made it just as far as the Suns!), but when we arrived the map only had a 4 acre maze on it. "4 acres? that's a bit shy of 10" I thought to myself, but none the less as soon as we came to the entrance to the maze, Krystina and I dove into it and started wandering around in it. We were late enough in the year that the corn was starting to dry and the path was pretty dusty, again if you have allergies stay out of the maze, it killed Krystina's allergies.

The maze was a blast, but if you really want to mess with your mind, watch Signs before you go and make sure you are in the cornfield at night! We made it out of the maze in about 30 minutes or so but we had to hurry because someone was having trouble breathing. Once we made it out of the field and hopped onto the hayride we discovered that we had gone through the mini-maze, the full size one was a hayride away and dwarfed the one we had just been in. From the looks of it, the full sized one would take a few hours to complete but I didn't want to drag my girlfriend through it and have her miserable the rest of the trip so we skipped that part. If you have a kid with you or just feel like being a kid, make sure you swing by the petting zoo for a few, it's got a few barnyard animals in it that you can get up close to and feed. While we were there, a sow had just had her babies and there were tiny little pigs running everywhere. I had to make a bad crack about bacon and got hit good and hard but you could tell every guy there was thinking the same thing, the chickens behind the pigs made breakfast even more inevitable. I think the most unique thing we found on the whole farm though was a 9-hole miniature golf course. You could play as many rounds of golf as you wanted free of charge so the course was a little busy when we first went, but when we played later at night everything had cleared up.

During the festival there is a large pumpkin patch with all different shapes and sizes of pumpkins throughout it. The prices of the pumpkins are moderate and you pay for them as you leave, so if you want a pumpkin it's best to wait until you are leaving. I did have a bit of disappointment with the pumpkin patch though, I had been expecting to see the pumpkin plants all growing perfectly with the pumpkins attached so that you could cut a fresh pumpkin and take it with you. Understandably though, all of the pumpkins had been precut and were scattered through the field (probably not the safest to have knives and small children in a lumpy, uneven field). All in all, I think I was most impressed at the festival by all of the various attractions, they really helped you remember you were out in the middle of nowhere on a working farm.